My Work Tarting Up Other Places

Tuesday, November 29, 2016

In the past few days, I've hit a perfect storm of media consumption that has spun me into a feminist spiral. So if you're not into wild-eyed ranting, please avert your eyes.

It all started with a friggin' Campfire girl meeting. A high school girl showed a short film she'd made on body image, then in a halting, nervous voice told about her struggles with an eating disorder. By the end, every mother there was in tears. In tears! Because we totally got it. We all had our thing--too fat, too thin, hair too weird, butt too little, butt too big, etc...--that made us so horribly not right.

The next night, I watched a Netflix doc called "Orgasm Inc." It was about how in the past few years, pharmaceutical companies, along with willing shills in the medical community, have popularized the "disease" of Female Sexual Dysfunction (FSD). (Not to be confused with FTD, which provides human females with unattractive flower arrangements).

"I think there is dissatisfaction and perhaps disinterest among a lot of women, but that doesn't mean they have a disease," said Dr. Sandra Leiblum, professor of psychiatry at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School in "Myth of female impotence 'created'" in the BBC News.

Word.

I'm not arguing that some women don't have sexual problems that could be improved medically, but a lot of the FDS "symptoms" are just the way women are. Yes, women can take a long time to come, yes, women can take awhile to get aroused (note: FTD flowers will not speed arousal time), and, yes, women get pissed at their mates which, yeah, fucking does affect desire.

In this study of FDS among women in Lower Egypt: Marital disharmony, 'hate' and unfavourable socio-economic circumstances were the most common aggravating factors (28.1%) for sexual dysfunction among the participants, followed by pregnancy-related events.

I'm not a doctor, but as far as I know, there is not a pill for curing "unfavourable socio-economic circumstances" and the like. (Although if there were, I would so fucking take it.)

One middle-aged women in Orgasm, Inc., ("middle-aged" = older than me) volunteered to be a guinea pig in some freaky-ass experimental procedure in which electrodes were inserted into her back. Into her back, as in under her skin. Did I mention that this was a totally untested procedure by, for all she knew, a completely iffy doctor?

The implants did nothing for her besides causing her to kick her left leg at random times. (This new trick, while novel and exciting, did not help her sex life.) The creepy invasive procedure did nothing to cure her "problem" which was--oh, dear god--inability to come during intercourse. Not inability to have an orgasm. Not inability to come if someone paid a whit of attention to her clit. No, this woman, raised on the notion that women's sexuality is just like men's--stick in it, pull it out, repeat til orgasm--believed that if she couldn't come from penetration alone, she was "ill."

The majority of women -- according to most studies, at least 70% -- do not and will not reach orgasm through vaginal intercourse or vagina-only stimulation (like "fingering" that's only about vaginal insertion) only.

So yeah, a little testosterone might help you out a bit (I said might--even this isn't certain), but seems to me the best way to alleviate FSD would be to spend a little time on arousal, make sure the female parts that feel pleasure are actually the parts that get stimulated (did I really just have to fucking write that sentence?)...plus a bunch of boring stuff like providing favorable economic conditions for the ladies and whatnot.

What is that? You have more sexual problems, you say? You've suddenly realized that your vag is not completely normal as you'd thought for years and years, but, in fact, hideously ugly and in need of surgical intervention. Don't worry, my ugly little freak, Vaginal Rejuvenation (i.e. plastic surgery for your vag) will fix any and all labia deemed unsightly.

What's sightly and what is not? Well, the highly lucrative Genital Mutilation Vaginal Rejuvenation centers that have popped up in the last few years (Hey....isn't that about the same time you started becoming displeased with your own vag? *shrugs* Weird.) have to find some way to keep the ladies coming in so currently they've determined that "too long" labia are "out." If you go ahead and get them shortened, I sure hope that long labia don't come into vogue because then you'll be bumming, huh?! (See also: The Sneetches by Dr. Seuss).

Check out these before and after Gential Muti Vaginal Rejuvenation photos from one place "helping" women.

Seriously!!!??? Not only did this chick not realize that she had a perfectly fine vag (I think it's a good one, actually, don't you?) but she actually thought it was so heinous that it required surgery--surgery!--to "correct". (Expensive surgery too. When I googled "vaginal rejuvenation" for you, the sponsored link offered a raffle for $1000 off. If they're offering $1000 off, you know that $%$# ain't cheap. Although I have to admit that the concept of a vag. rejuvenation raffle is sort of appealing in its utter wrongness. Coming soon...penile bleaching cake walk.)

Okay.

I would hope that we women would all come to our fucking senses and just...stop it. Realize how totally fine we are and get on with more important things (see above: taking time with and enjoying arousal). At the very least, I can think of about 6 million better ways to spend our time and money than getting friggin' surgery.

However, as it looks now, I think that the only things that's changing is that more men are buying into this crap too with their pec implants, ED drugs, and the like.

My big wish is that one day someone will be lying on an operating table, legs open wide as they watch a surgeon walking toward them eyeing their groin and wielding some sharp pointy thing and the patient ("patient" = "regular person misled by fucked up societal norms") will think, "What the fucking hell am I doing?!?"

And, O, they shall Rise Up and Spread their Enlightenment among the people, who shall toss aside their sense of shame and unworthiness, and be free to rush forth into the forest where they shall fuck freely and joyfully under the dense green canopy of the trees. (Note: future scenario includes ecological renewal, elimination of STDs, and men and women with true knowledge of each other's sexualities. Void where prohibited by law.)

xoxo
jill

P.S. Meanwhile, just yesterday, I paid $45 for a tube of cream that promises to even out skin tone. One of the ingredients "might cause mercury poisoning."

Tuesday, November 15, 2016

His given name is Buck and he was sent to me by Good Vibrations for a forthcoming story on pegging.

Buck came in a clear plastic cylinder, as though he'd been captured in the wild, mid-fuck, but only temporarily subdued. Even after his long journey through the postal service, he remained swollen and hard.

A few days later, when no one was around, I pulled him out from under my bed--where the pervy things live--and held him tentatively.

Not to brag, but he is pretty fucking glorious. Buck's not too long, but super thick--like so thick that when I tried to wrap my hand around him, only my thumb and middle finger could touch. He is firm but has a soft outside that feels preternaturally realistic. His girth makes him seems sort of brutish, like the kind of dick who would fuck while wearing a wife beater.

According to random internet articles, upon receiving a new penis, you should first get used to wearing it. I guess it's like trying on new shoes and walking around the shoe store, except not with shoes and certainly not at the shoe store because although I suppose the specific law "don't walk around a shoe store test-wearing your new dildo" is not on the books, it's probably still some sort of misdemeanor.

I was too wigged out to do the test run at home--the thought of anyone coming to my door and seeing me wearing Buck about the house was unacceptable. So I snuck him out in a bag and took him to a house where I was dog-sitting. (Um, if I happen to dog sit for you, this was totally not your house.)

I was weirdly elated as I got out all the new paraphernalia. There was Buck standing erect, as is his way, plus a black leather harness thing. (Not this one specifically, but kinda like it.) It's like a string bikini, with a dildo hole thing on the front ("dildo hole" is not its actual name, at least I hope not) and adjustable straps on the sides. My particular harness was truly one-size-fits-all. Not only did it fit me, but it could accommodate up to a 52 inch waist. If nothing else, I could always save it as a pair of makeshift fat pants, in case nothing else fit.

After an embarrassing amount of time, though one could argue that this is the least embarrassing thing I've told you so far, I finally figured out the tangle of leather straps and saddled up. I stuck Buck out through the dildo hole, adjusted him so he was sticking up and out at a jaunty angle and walked out to the kitchen to get a feel for dick-having.

It seemed, actually, normal enough. I felt that if called upon, I could wield this cock. I knew what it was to be well-fucked and I could simply do those things from the other side of the equation. So with both of the kinds of cockiness inherent in my situation (jesus, sorry, what's wrong w/ me?),* I wandered back to the bedroom to behold myself, be-dicked, in the floor-to-ceiling mirrors.

It was at that moment that the dog came into the room, poked his nose between my legs, and immediately started licking Buck.

As I yanked my penis away (for better or worse, Buck, sensationless, felt nothing) I caught a quick glimpse of myself in the mirror--wearing a silicone penis and being fellated by a dog.

It was, to date, the most fucked up moment of my life.

I'm not sure if it was the existential absurdity of the moment or the magnitude of wrongness going on at once, but as I drove home to wash the living hell out of Buck, I sort of pleased with myself. Like, "Yeah, I'm the kind of chick who has subversive #@%$ like this going on." It's probably not the correct way to respond, but that's what happened with me.

xoxo
jill

*It says a lot about me, none of it horribly favorable, that I feel way
more embarrassed about the bad joke than the general content of this
entire post.

Note: this article ran first on AlterNet then on Salon. Only the (third) best for you, my friend!

*****

“There are only two tragedies in
life: one is not getting what one wants, the other is getting it,”
said Oscar Wilde.

Passion is a tricky, elusive thing.
Once captured, it flounders. But why does it wither when
domesticated? Why do sexy intense beginnings so often lead to boring,
sexless or otherwise meh middles and ending? Why aren't we
having sex with our dear, highly-available partner, like, all the
time?

“Our
senses crave novelty. Any change alerts them, and they send a signal
into the brain. If there's no change, no novelty, they doze and
register little or nothing. A constant state—even of excitement—in
time becomes tedious, fades in the background because our senses have
evolved to report only changes,” writes Diane Ackerman in A
Natural History of the Senses.*

Or, says my friend Matthew, who thinks
deeply on such things: “Once you're with someone, they become your
family. And you don't want to have sex with people in your family.”
Which is true enough, especially that last bit.

But these Big Thinkers in the field say you can re-find passion, though they offer
differing--sometimes wildly so—theories on how to do it. With the right philosophical constructs guiding your behavior, perhaps you'll soon be happily fucking your beloved
family member again. Though you'll probably want to phrase that
differently in your head.

The Big Idea: 'Karezza”
sex can help hack your neurochemicals, which thanks to the cruel
cruel Coolidge
Effect, make you feel less satisfied with your partner over time.
Even if, actually especially if, they are really great at
pleasing you.

The Fix: The neurochemicals that make
us so giddy with the first flush of love only last two years, tops.
After that, the buzz wears off and couples get habituated (the nicer,
more sciencey term for bored). Instead of trying to jack things up
with new positions or sexy clown costumes which can further numb
response to pleasure, slow things down with karezza sex, a form of
affectionate, sensual sex that generally doesn't result in orgasm.
This sex, according to Robinson, strengthens lovers' bonds and
results in more frequent and satisfying sex. “It's like learning
to diet by eating smarter, rather than struggling to eat less,”
writes
Robinson. “As my husband says, 'My limbic brain stays enchanted
because I don't attempt to fertilize you.'” (Her husband, it will
not surprise you to learn, is a science professor.)

Test drive: Practice a “bonding
behavior” like gazing into each other's eyes for several
minutes or lying with your head on your partner's chest and listening
to their heartbeat or synchronized breathing.

The Big Idea: Women are deep and
endless sources of sexuality. Exploring that eroticism leads to
richer, more profound sexual/spiritual connection.

The Fix: A woman's sexuality is “much
deeper and longer lasting than a man's. In the face of such
intensity, most husbands fear they can't measure up,” writes
Boteach in The Kosher Sutra: 8
Sacred Secrets for Reigniting Desire and Restoring Passion for Life.
But for the husband who's brave enough to jump in there and explore,
there are sublime pleasures to be uncovered. “There is a part of
us, a passionate part that is raw, instinctive, animal, visceral, and
not attuned to social norms. It's incredibly erotic to witness this
side of a person become revealed. A man who can arouse a woman to
this level of abandonment witnesses something incredible,” writes
Boteach, in perhaps the hottest collection of sentences you'll
ever read by a rabbi. This deep sensuality flows into the rest of
life, giving everything an “erotic pulse.”

To get to that place, Boteach
recommends “Kosher Tantric” sex, including delayed orgasm to
prolong sex, making it into “a worship of the divine spark in each
other.” He's also against going to the bathroom in front of each
other—ruins the mystery.

Test drive: Try the Jewish custom of
abstaining from sex for two weeks when the woman starts her period.
“Every month, there must be two
weeks devoted to physical love, and two weeks devoted to intellectual
communication and emotional intimacy," Boteach
writes in Kosher
Sex: A Recipe for Passion and Intimacy. It may sound a bit old
school and rigid, but the forbiddenness fostered by abstinence can
build lust, plus the on/off plan happens to correspond nicely with
most women's monthly swings of desire.

The Big Idea: We need safety and
security in a relationship, yet we also need adventure and
excitement. The problem is that satisfying either of these needs
sort of negates the other. The trick is riding the wave between
security and excitement, figuring out ways to introduce novelty, risk
and mystery into the familiar and comfortable.

The Fix: The erotic thrives on power
plays, thwarted desire, threats of rivals and other non-safe and
lovey ideas. Tap into these rich sources of desire by questioning
your ideas about what's “acceptable” to you—for a lot of people
their greatest sources of excitement and pleasure have to do with
childhood hurts. Being willing to poke around in these dark areas of
your erotic brain is a potent natural fuel for pleasure.

Test drive: Embrace the “shadow of
the third.” In every relationship, there are other players, whether
actual infidelities, flirtations or agreed upon partners. Accepting
this and working with it--whether by actually introducing others into
your marital sex, negotiating monogamy or just feeling the arousal of
a threat (perceived or real) of a romantic rival—beats complacency
back and helps you see your mate as the desirable creature that they
are.

Husband and wife psychologists
who run the Gottman Institute and the Relationship Research
Institute.

The Big Idea: Married people do best
when they behave like good friends and handle conflicts in gentle
positive ways.

The Fix: The Gottmans are known their
Love Labs in which they observed couples and found that future
divorcees tended to handle conflict via what the Gottmans call “The
4 Horseman of the Apocalypse”: stonewalling, contempt,
defensiveness and withdrawal. So don't do those.

Good behaviors, which lack a catchy 4
Horseman-like name: Respond positively to your partner's “bids”
(bids are requests for emotional connections via a question, quick
hug and such). Create a love map--a mental list of your partner's
preferences, dreams, and sexual proclivities. Create rituals for
initiating and refusing sex to minimize miscommunication and feelings
of rejection. The resulting atmosphere of kindness and communication
is conducive to “personal sex” that's focused on intimacy instead
of intercourse.

Test Drive: “Plan time for
activities like hot baths, back rubs, touching, holding and simply
making each other feel good physically and emotionally. If sex
happens, that's fine. But if it doesn't, you'll still have met your
expectation of enjoying time together,” advise
the Gottmans.

Psychologist, sex therapist and
director of the Marriage and Family Health Institute.

The Big Idea: Passion (as well as a
healthy relationship) depends on “differentiation,” that is, each
partner cultivating a strong sense of self, despite their partner's
(very normal) efforts to thwart that growth.

The Fix: When partners work on
becoming differentiated, it creates tension and gridlock. This
coupled, with what Schnarch delightfully calls “normal marital
sadism,” can lead to marital breakdown, but it's actually an
opportunity. Gridlock and tension create a dynamic environment for
growth and helps passion thrive. Anxiety is also good. Instead of
working on anxiety reduction, couples should work on ways to tolerate
anxiety via self-soothing. “Anxiety is often part of the best sex
we ever have. It's part of growing sexually. Anxiety makes us pay
attention to what's going on,” writes
Schnarch.

During sex, couples should focus on the
connection, working on truly feeling their partner as they touch
them. Also good is “hugging til relaxed” which is pretty much
what it sounds like.

Test drive: Try for “eyes-open
orgasm.” Looking deep into each other's eyes adds intimacy and
meaning to sex. The more you do it, the longer you can do it and the
deeper the connection.

Thursday, November 10, 2016

So depressing was my image of the post-election day Fuck Chair yesterday that several people were compelled to write to me asking if I was okay. Which yes, and I am beyond grateful that so many people would be on the lookout (you never know!). And of course, at the same time, I am also not okay with what the fuck happened on election day.

Yesterday my mother called us and on speaker phone gave my girls an incredibly moving speech about not listening to the messages they were hearing and to know that they still had value, dammit. This is something you don't generally have to tell people. Anyway, at the end we were all weeping.

Then my 15 year old daughter went and made a Sim of Tr*mp wetting his own pants while over-Tweeting. My friend said we shoulda done the one where he was in a pool then taken away the ladder, but this felt like a cleaner, though immature, schadenfreude.

Oh. Yeah.

Today I am in the anger phrase which I expressed by writing a disturbingly long comment to some dude on Facebook I barely know. I recognize that that was not a good use of my time.

In other news that now sounds jarringly hollow and not nearly as fun as it did when it heard it last week, I was #8 on Kinkly's Top 100 Sex Blogging Superheroes of 2016. I adore the site and turn to it for surreptitious midnight web searches on "How do you do X?" or "Wtf is Y?" But what wrecked me* the most with how they so got what I'm trying to do here: "This blog is funny - like, hilarious - but it's also thoughtful in a way
that leaves you feeling a little better about yourself after you read
it. We like that."

And, yes, I do hope I leave you feeling a little better about yourself sometimes, or at least that I've reminded you to do all necessary peeing before embarking on a Tweet storm.

xoxo
jill

* I am highly motivated by extrinsic rewards. Not good, but hey, it's not smoking crack so I'm not gonna worry about it too much.

Tuesday, November 8, 2016

“It's kind of like Wonka's Chocolate
Factory, but for sex toys :-),” emailed Erica Braverman, Communications and PR Manager for Doc Johnson, inviting me to tour their North Hollywood factory.

The 215,000 square ft sex toy factory, the largest in North America, once housed a novelty company until Ron
Braverman, Erica's father, bought the business in 1976 and ditched
everything but the sex toys. “A
few of our initial product offerings included our 8” Classic Dong,
Motion Lotion, and our Classic Butt Plug in three sizes,” says
Erica. In a market where it's now not (that) weird to use the word
“classic” when describing a butt plug, Doc Johnson is thriving,
cranking out 2,500 different products, 75% of them made in America.

When I got to the factory, instead of being greeted by a chocolate
river—which, for the record, would have been nice--there were
gigantic cans of mystery substances labeled enigmatically, like
“black jelly base, fresh breeze scent.” And, to my delight, the
factory floor truly was Wonka-esque. Everywhere I looked, there were
brightly colored sex toys being molded, shaped, and otherwise being
handled in a way that would constitute sexual harassment were they
real body parts.

After popping my eyes back into my
head, I managed to learn a few things about sex toys and the industry
as a whole. Namely:

--Flavored lubes are no longer just
that one cloying strawberry flavor.

There is an insanely huge array of
lubes, gels and body icings to make your partner's private parts
taste less like private parts and more like marshmallow fluff, red licorice or red velvet cake. A cinnamon bun spray I tried was
surprisingly good. (For a more literal interpretation of “cinnamon
bun,” there's a hot cinnamon anal lube, perhaps so you can freshen
your breath while licking someone's ass. #Multitasking.)
Inexplicably, ye olde strawberry is still the top seller. I imagine
that they're shipping most of these back to 1975, but I didn't ask.

--The person molding your next strap-on
is most likely a kindly-looking Latino woman in her 40s or 50s.

Doc's line workers move diligently and
efficiently, weaving pubes onto disembodied vulvas or hot ironing
genitalia to get it just so. As they brusquely power sand various
body parts—a sight which is extremely difficult not to
anthromorphize--most wear the kind of expression of someone who could
be just as easily be slapping labels on cans of peas. Long inured to
the sight of a big pile of unpainted dildos awaiting their attention,
their demeanor is somewhere between “Sigh, these realistic veins
aren't gonna paint themselves” and a serenity akin to companionable
silence of a longtime sewing circle, but with pubic hair.

--Sex cosmetics are a thing and it's a
huge market.

Sex cosmetics promise all kinds of
magical-sounding benefits and include everything from sprays that
plump lips, prevent dry mouth and numb the throat for optimal oral sex to lubes that warm, cool and/or enhance sensitivity. There's a
Sta-Erect cream, a prolonging spray and all manner of arousal gels
including a new “liquid vibrator” that somehow starts vibrating
after application which, if you must know, I'm too afraid to try.
There's also fake cum (several types!) as well as faux pee.

Doc's sculptor/artist's is Anjani
Siddhartha, an earthy, sexy woman of indeterminate age who is
currently working on a toy that looks like a finial for a curtain
rod. Like that bad recurring 1993 SNL skit where the shopkeeper saw
everything through the lens of “you can put your weed in it,”
Siddhartha looks at everything—yes, including your finials—to see
could be made fuckable. Surprisingly often, the answer is yes.

--Fake vaginas, like real ones, are
full of mystery.

My three takeaways.

--Fake vaginas have no curb appeal. All
the good stuff is near the entry point and inside, so the outside is
just kind of a flesh colored rubbery rectangle. Thus, packaging on
fake Vs is hugely important.

--There is no preference in labia shape
or size. Any woman still worried about her own equipment can stop
this very second.

--Porn stars regularly come in to have
molds taken of their body parts. For the female porn stars molds, the
labia is an accurate, spot-on re-creation, but the inside is generic,
that is, pussy approximate.

"Toys for heterosexual man are a huge
emerging market,” says Erica. “Straight men are discovering they
have a prostate, which basically like the female g-spot.” To
facilitate these tentative explorers, Doc has several beginner anal training kits, with sets of butt plugs, a vibrator and lube, so you
can “kind of work your way up,” says Erica. She likens their
popularity to the appeal of well-stocked makeup kits. You might not
use all those eye shadows (or...butt plugs) but it's fun to have the
array of options.

--Branding has made it to the sex toy
industry.

Before sex toys went mainstream, you
got what you got, style-wise—generally that style statement was a
combo of utilitarian and sleazy. Now it's kinda gauche to stick just
any old thing between your legs. High-end stuff that's more artsy/less body part-looking is big, like the Tryst Multi-Erogenous Zone Vibrator. Branding at Doc's includes the
upscale, GQ-ish OptiMALE line, a line with Kink.com full of black
leather and fucking machines, and WonderLand, with toys packaged like a whimsical fairy tale book. If a Tim Burton character needed to take
the edge off, they would for sure reach for a WonderLand toy.

--At Doc Johnson, there is no official
job of Product Tester.

Sorry.

--Not all factory tours end with some sort of poetic comeuppance, ala Wonka tours.
That is, I was not overfucked by an onslaught of dildos for my sin of Lust. Still unsure if that's good or bad.

About Me

I write In Bed With Married Women, a blog about sex in all its boring, strange, funny, smokin' hot glory. My work has also appeared in Salon, AlterNet, Cosmopolitan, Rolling Stone, Entertainment Weekly, Jezebel, Mad, Games and the Los Angeles Times. I look grumpy in all pictures whether grumpy or just kinda neutral.